The Genetic Frontier

Some scientists say human engineering is possible, and imminent. But is it a good idea?

MARK WILLIAMS

“No one really has the guts to say it.” James Watson, codiscoverer of the structure of DNA, tells a panel of the world’s leading molecular biologists in 1998, before putting the lie to his own statement by bluntly asking the question: “If we can make better human beings by adding new genes, why shouldn’t we?”

It’s typical Watson rhetoric, reported by Gregory Stock in his book Redesigning Humans: Our Inevitable Genetic Future. All the same, as our information technologies are increasingly turned upon the data in our own genes, humans who would be longer-lived and smarter—and perhaps saner—seem a feasible, attractive project to many people besides simply Dr. Watson. Conversely, for many other observers, the notion of a self-designed human species is disquieting. For some, it’s loathsome. Playing God, losing our humanity, employing Nazi-style eugenic programs, and instating genetic apartheid: foes of human genetic enhancement darkly recite a standard litany of such charges.

Amid the tizzy on both sides, how likely is it that we will manipulate human genes in any meaningful way within the next two decades? After all, serious practical obstacles exist. Critically, many traits we might desire to upgrade—for instance, intelligence and aging—appear not to correlate to single genes, but to be caused by large numbers of them and regulated by networks of other genes and poorly understood loops of RNA, transcription factors, and, surely, undiscovered mechanisms.

Hence, our scope for genetic engineering through single-gene fixes may be severely limited, as are our current abilities to fix single genes. Besides, talk of designer babies and “posthumans” reeks of both science fiction and self-improvement cultism.